‘We have to show strength’: Calls grow for U.S. to deter Russian hackers

One missing ingredient, some intelligence leaders say, is an explicit message from Washington about the consequences Russia would face for a cyberattack on critical targets such as the United States’ power grid.

“While I think the red lines have been made clear for several years now — and underscored most recently in the president’s signal to President Putin that targeting of infrastructure remains a clear red line for the U.S. — what has been less clear has been the U.S. articulation of the specific consequences for crossing those red lines,” Senate Intelligence Chair Mark Warner (D-Va.) said in a statement to POLITICO.

During a meeting in Geneva last year, Biden handed Putin a list of the 16 infrastructure sectors that the U.S. has long defined as “critical,” telling him they should be off limits to cyberattacks. The sprawling list includes energy, dams, food, hospitals, financial services, communications and government facilities.

“I pointed out to him we have significant cyber capability, and he knows it,” Biden told reporters afterward. Biden added, “He knows I will take action.”

But Friday’s hack of the Ukrainian websites — which early indications linked to Russia — show that Putin may be willing to test those boundaries.

Biden needs to be willing to respond aggressively if Russia crosses the line, said Rep. Jim Langevin (D-R.I.), chair of the House Armed Services Committee’s cybersecurity subcommittee.

“Should Russia — or the criminal hackers that Putin allows to freely operate within his borders — threaten American hospitals, utilities, or other critical infrastructure, the U.S. must consider using all instruments of state power in response to such blatant aggression,” Langevin said in a statement Thursday.

Russia and other nations including China, Iran and North Korea have not been shy in attacking U.S. companies and agencies over the past decade, penetrating targets including banks, insurance companies, the electric grid and the U.S. agency that maintains the nation’s nuclear weapons.

Russia has long…